


Sixty for Sixty: 60-word ACD Sherlock Holmes Stories (2017)

by gardnerhill



Series: Sixty for Sixty: 60-word ACD Sherlock Holmes Stories [3]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Community: sherlock60, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 15:14:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 65
Words: 3,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13238433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: Sixty-word ACD stories for the 2017-2018 round of the LJ/DW Comm Sherlock60 - this time in alphabetical order of the 4-letter Canon abbreviations.





	1. 3GAB - The Three Gables: Shingle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s a snoop and he’s good with his fists. Cue the theme-music.

“’Wicked to tell fibs,’ as if he ain’t told enough ‘isself,” Susan sniffed. “Reckon I’m as good at findin’ out things as he is.”

 

Steve Dixie stared into his beer. “I could outbox that doctor bodyguard of his.”

 

Tall thin white woman and large black man looked at each other. And grinned.

 

“Harrow Detective Agency?” suggested Dixie.

 

They shook hands.


	2. 3GAR - The Three Garridebs: Poetic License

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their target’s real nickname is revealed.

“ _Bunny_ Evans?”

 

Holmes looked away from my glare. “A, er, reputation for…running like a rabbit when cornered.”

 

I folded my arms. “You could have asked me to join you because you wanted my company, you know. You didn’t have to create a fictional hazard.”

 

He nodded.

 

I pursed my lips. “I hear Simpson’s has a _dangerous_ beef roast.”

 

We laughed.


	3. 3STU - The Three Students: So Painful A Scandal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Victorian-school definition, that is.

My friend read the headmaster’s incident book. “Two lads setting a lower form on fire.”

 

Soames hand-waved. “Good wholesome character-building.”

 

“Four deaths due to hazing last year. An upper-form’s servant boy beaten nearly to death.” Holmes fixed Soames with a stare. “But a student looking at an exam paper –“

 

“Is a scandal from which St. Luke may never recover!”


	4. ABBE - The Abbey Grange: For Harry, England, and Riding Saint George

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Next time, make sure your lover is familiar with _Henry V._
> 
>  **Warning** : Postulation in progress.

“Come, Watson, come.” Holmes’ voice was low, imperious. A warm hand on my shoulder. “The game is afoot.”

 

I chuckled, not opening my eyes. “Game, is it?” I rolled onto my stomach and parted my legs. “All right, darling, let’s play – but I shan’t be very active as I’m still half asl–”

 

“No, you dolt, we have a case!”


	5. BERY - The Beryl Coronet: The Precious Treasure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Look a little harder under your roof, Mr. Holder.

Inventory:

 

One son reviled as a wastrel, the wronged party who defended the family’s honour.

 

One daughter revered as an angel, who fell from grace in an actual wastrel’s clutches.

 

A few stones in a lump of metal, described as the most valuable thing in the house.

 

One man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.


	6. BLAC - Black Peter: From Hell’s Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Looks like other old salts found out about 221b.

A sailorman stumped into our parlour, harpoon in hand. “I need you to help me find the Great White.”

 

“Splendid disguise, Holmes!” I said. “A pitch-perfect American accent. The false peg-leg’s a nice touch.”

 

“What was that, Watson?” came Holmes’ voice from his room.

 

I turned back and smiled sheepishly at our furious client. “Please stop pointing that at me.”


	7. BLAN - Blanched Soldier: Suspension of Disbelief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some writing errors are unforgiveable to Doctor Watson.

Watson buried his face in his hands over the STRAND issue, shaking his head.

 

Holmes leaned over his friend, anxious. “Did my use of ‘helpmeet’ embarrass you? Or calling you ‘selfish’ – apologies, Watson, your Jean is a witty and lovely creature –“

 

“Holmes,” Watson groaned at last. “You can NOT catch leprosy from one night’s stay in a leper colony!”


	8. BLUE - Blue Carbuncle: Think of My Father, My Mother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s more than one way to interpret James Ryder’s plea.

“Oi, Gladys, Sonny-boy is ‘ome,” George Ryder said disgustedly. “So where’s the brass from flogging the shiny?”

 

“I…I hid it in a, a goose,” James stammered. "It...  got away.”

 

Mrs. Ryder shrieked and did her best to faint. “Our Christmas! Ruint! How’ll we bribe the peelers now?”

 

“We GOT you that JOB for ONE reason!” dad roared in between blows.


	9. BOSC - Boscombe Valley Mystery: Ulterior

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Major Morstan didn’t raise any stupid kids.

I got John out the door by confirming his wishes on the matter in seconds; he was off to Mr. Holmes for a few days.

 

I was on the ‘phone before the hansom was out of earshot. “Darling, he’s gone. I’ll be there in the hour. You’re at the same hotel? Splendid.”

 

And soon I was listening to Emmeline Pankhurst.


	10. BRUC - The Bruce-Partington Plans: Mirror, Mirror

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft ponders families and the nature of opposition.

For a little money and power he murdered a decent man, betrayed his country, besmirched his family name, and broke his elder brother’s heart.

 

Water quenches fire. Base solution neutralises acid. Light ends darkness.

 

For a little mental exercise and patriotism he tracked down a wicked man, served his country, glorified his family name, and made his elder brother proud.


	11. CARD - The Cardboard Box: Karma Houdini

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Named for the TV Tropes term for a character that escapes punishment.

“Jim sent us, Sarah,” Mary said brightly. “He was hanged today.”

 

Alec Fairbairn nodded, staring at the transfixed woman to whom they’d just appeared. “Yet the one who turned him against his blameless wife escaped punishment.”

 

“Until now,” Mary said, and her eyes glowed white.

 

*

 

“Bedlam for this one,” said the constable as the shrieking straightjacketed woman was dragged out.


	12. CHAS - Charles Augustus Milverton: Nature Abhors a Vacuum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone must take his place.

The word spread fast in the underground, and the time was set.

 

The day of Milverton’s funeral a cluster of men gathered in a vile Limehouse dogfighting pit.

 

“You know the rules, you bastards,” growled Sanderson the grave-robber.

 

“Aye,” said Jack Dickerson, the bull-buggering priest-killer.

 

Baby-Eating O’Brian grinned. “Last one living…”

 

“…Is the new Worst Man in London. Now _fight!_ ”


	13. COPP - Copper Beeches: Hunter and Prey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Can’t blame a governess for trying.

He speaks German and French, is a violin virtuoso, has art in his family.

 

I tell him my talents as a governess (German and French, music, drawing).

 

I unpin my wealth of beautiful hair practically into his lap – which has melted stronger men in this time.

 

But his eyes are only for his Doctor when he shoots Carlo, not me.


	14. CREE - The Creeping Man: Old Dog New Tricks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a place for everybody.

The well-dressed Englishman had a French accent. “Professor Presbury. I could use a man like you back home.” And repeated the phrase in the Professor’s new language, flawlessly.

 

Presbury stopped grooming the young man’s hair, astonished, and hooted back.

 

“He’ll be coming back with me to my African birthplace,” the man said.

 

Bennett wrung his hand. “Thank you, Lord Greystoke.”


	15. CROO - The Crooked Man: Sir Richard of the Lea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robin Hood once aided a knight in distress – and was repaid with sanctuary at his estate. A vignette in my “Wounded Warriors” series.

“You had the Army start my pension. Saved me from begging or starving.”

 

Watson barely comprehended Corporal Wood’s words through his blanket of grief.

 

“You knew where to flee to lick your wounds,” said the crooked man. “Old soldiers who’ve lost friend and wife in the same year go where soldiers are. I know. Stay as long as you need.”

 


	16. DANC - The Dancing Men: Widowed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A question that cannot even be posed. 
> 
> **Warning:** Postulation hinted at. Also, you may get feels on this ride.

_Dear Mrs. Cubitt: How do you bear it?_

I stared at the sheet. The inked words blurred together from more than my whisky intake.

 

If I sent this letter, it would tarnish his legacy forever even if I never went to Reading.

 

I crumpled the paper and flung it in the fire, just missing the cigarette case holding his note.


	17. DEVI - The Devil’s Foot: The Deplorable Laws of England

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They can all agree on this.

This man of the law, this English man, who found me out and tracked me like a sorcerer – his stone-grey eyes change when I castigate British legalities that kept me from freely expressing my love.

 

The other man doesn’t hide his sympathy for me. Nor does he disguise the anxious glances he gives Holmes.

 

No wonder they let me go.


	18. DYIN - The Dying Detective: Quick, Man, If You Love Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quick, yes. Just not the man nor the love you were expecting.

“Coals of fire, Holmes – coals of…” Culverton Smith paused. “Did your bedstead thump?”

 

“Oysters!” the malingerer gasped, and flung up his hand as if in delirium to strike the headboard.

 

#

 

"It was really your fault, Holmes,” Watson insisted, rumpled and unrepentant.

 

Lestrade, equally rumpled, nodded. “If you _will_ have both the Doctor and myself confined in the same small space…”


	19. EMPT - The Empty House: Busted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maybe Sherlock Holmes hadn’t been his actual target.

Wax effigies throughout that hideous mausoleum just down the street – perpetrated by that French ghoul who’d made casts of the royal heads during the Reign of Terror. Horrific and unnatural things.

 

A simple plan: aim through the windows and mutilate them all.

 

Moran raised his air-gun and grinned. He’d start with that ridiculous bust of Holmes that wasn’t fooling anyone. 


	20. ENGR The Engineer’s Thumb: History

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So no one is doomed to repeat it.

Granddad folded paper into snowflakes at Christmas, and birds that flapped their wings when you pulled the tail. He laughed, said it exercised both his hands. 

But when my employer promised a very large bonus for a shady job, Grandad put his foot down. “Let me tell you, Jonah,” he said, holding up his four-fingered hand, “how I lost this.”


	21. FINA The Final Problem: Away Upon a Visit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s a soldier’s daughter. That’s all I’m saying.

Someone was after Mr. Holmes. He undoubtedly feared to ask John for help. 

Pleading a visit to Mrs. Forrester, I left Kensington; I kept watch on Baker Street in disguise.

The tall bald man leaving 221b fell, knifed by that pretty woman he passed unthinking. That night the military man with the airgun outside my home died the same way.


	22. FIVE The Five Orange Pips: Waterloo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A sadly-fitting name for that station.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** Veers from Canon to twist the knife deeper.

I sent Watson with young Openshaw, of course – I should have been guilty of negligent homicide otherwise. It was the correct thing to do. 

Three brutes attacked their cab near the train station. Watson fought all three, and Openshaw fled to safety; the assailants arrested, the case closed. 

Yet I would slay Openshaw myself if it would bring John back.


	23. GLOR The Gloria Scott: Gang Aft Agley

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

“Victor Trevor was your first?” I caressed his knee. “How did you fare?”

“Poorly.” Holmes sighed, rummaging through his papers. “On our first holiday, my deductions helped ruin Victor’s father’s health just in time for another man’s appearance to take his life altogether. We broke up after that.”

I winced. “Then it’s good my father died before _we_ met. Ow!”


	24. GOLD The Golden Pince-Nez: All Virtuous Folk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “All virtuous folk have been long in bed” – and these two are still up. Hmmm….

“Watson, the Yoxley case…” Holmes glared over my manuscript. “Your description of Hopkins’ visit.”

“Yes?” I said blandly. 

“Stressing his youth? My hoping Hopkins had ‘no designs upon us’ even as I make him welcome like an intimate? A subtle attack on his virtue?”

“Should I have told the _whole truth_?” I drawled.

“…We’d all be in Reading,” Holmes conceded.


	25. GREE The Greek Interpreter: Window Seat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First impressions can be surprisingly accurate.

That man at the crosswalk intrigues me. 

An Army surgeon, not long from the subcontinent. Wounded in combat, and fell ill afterward. Writes a good deal. An invert, and one happily settled with his _paramour_ if that tilt of his head tells no lies…

Ah. Here comes Sherlock to join him before crossing the street. So this is Dr. Watson.


	26. HOUN The Hound of the Baskervilles, Ch. 1-4: Prognostication

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’re not wrong, though.

“Aye, the Dog-killer’s got another one,” said the Bulldog gloomily. 

“He looks fine, Reggie!” yipped his fellow stray, a rangy lurcher mix. Both watched as a human and a curly-haired spaniel walked through the door down the street, greeting the old woman.

“That place is death for dogs!” Reggie growled. “Mark my words, Dorcas – that poor little blighter is doomed.”


	27. HOUN The Hound of the Baskervilles, Ch. 5-8: Between the Lines

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hudson and his hen-pheasants aren’t the only ones who need to speak obliquely.

My dear Holmes: 

As ordered, I must not miss a report you ordered – so terribly imperiously! – so I write. I am resolute; Baskerville’s afraid but says I do not want for courage. Your Boswell’s a touch rusty; words come slowly sometimes to paper. Let me practice, and soon all of my skill I love will fill your reports. Sincerely, Watson.  
 


	28. HOUN The Hound of the Baskervilles, Ch. 9-12: The Man on the Tor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Hound of the Baskervilles” - Directed by Ed Wood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** Extreme crack ahead. May prove incomprehensible to non-Americans.

Selden the convict loomed over Sir Henry and me, a massive bald behemoth with one expression: a contorted scowl. “Stay off moor,” he rumbled in a Swedish accent, his enormous fists flexing. 

And suddenly Sherlock Holmes was wrapped around the lummox’s huge head. “Run!” he shouted. 

As we stumbled past pasteboard headstones we heard a man in angora shout, “Cut!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Author’s Note:** Ed Wood Jr. was a 1950s American filmmaker infamous for making cheap, poorly-acted horror movies. His stable of actors included fallen-on-hard-times Bela Lugosi – and a Swedish wrestler named Tor Johnson.


	29. HOUN The Hound of the Baskervilles, Ch. 13 - 15: Bulldogged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They hadn’t expected help from this quarter.

Holmes and I raced after the glowing mountainous beast pursuing the terrified Sir Henry, dread at the inevitable filling us. 

A small blur of white and black dashed in from the side and bowled the Hound off its feet. 

Stunned, we caught up, and our guns ended the creature.

And the three of us petted a gaunt, tail-wagging curly-haired spaniel.


	30. IDEN A Case of Identity: Shame the Devil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Watson is not afraid of tiger cubs or deluded women.

Holmes examined the livid red hand-print on Watson’s cheek. “You told her. I warned you what would happen.”

 

“And you were wrong.”

 

Arched eyebrows.

 

“Holmes, Mary Sutherland slapped me _because_ she believed me – her broken heart demanding shared pain in that first moment.”

 

“And now?”

 

“She accepted Mrs. Hudson’s boarding-house recommendation. Mary will flee her unspeakable family within the fortnight.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a 60-word retelling of a longer story of mine (in Mary Sutherland’s POV), [Tigress](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11584320).


	31. ILLU The Illustrious Client: Perversion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One sexuality has the sanction of Victorian society. The other does not.

An open book was laid before her. His diary, his handwriting. And describing in obscene detail a “Jeanne’s” flesh. 

She slammed it shut. But his words remained before her.

The look of sympathy on Sir James’ face was the worst part. 

*** 

“John,” Holmes murmured tenderly. “Kissing my abrasions will not actually make them better.”

“Who’s the doctor here?” Watson countered.


	32. LADY The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax: History Repeats

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They had gotten away at the end, after all. And they have an M.O.

They escaped, after the horror they inflicted on Lady Frances over her few baubles. 

They must have seen the pearl on Watson’s watch-fob, a memento of his first spouse. 

I tear through the cemetery; another gathering lowers a too-large coffin into the ground.

If I am too late, no rope will keep me from what I do to those two.


	33. LAST His Last Bow: Preventative Medicine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Desperate times call for desperate measures.

We went for a walk on the cliffs, and Watson slipped. 

When rescued, he proved to have a broken leg from the fall. He is convalescing in my Sussex house, sorry that this mishap will keep him from the war. 

Mycroft saw what was coming, and told me. And I loosened the gravel above that ledge. 

He is safe now.


	34. LION The Lion’s Mane: Best of Helpmates and Best of Men

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Watson comes for one of his weekend visits.

“I read your ‘Lion’s Mane’ in the Strand.” 

Writing it had been excruciating – and I knew it was not half as good as Watson’s lesser accounts. After years of my castigating him for his writing style…

He tapped my beer glass with his own. “It’s such hard work getting the words down just right, isn’t it?”

I’ve never deserved Watson.


	35. MAZA The Mazarin Stone: Two Thumbs Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Translations of one’s work vary in quality.

They left the theatre.

 

“Well?”

 

A snort.

 

Watson sighed. “I agree. A poor mish-mash of better cases, a ridiculous villain. There’s a touch of cleverness in using the gramophone, but…”

 

“Doyle's play made you look like a buffoon!” Holmes snapped. “Unforgiveable.”

 

Watson patted the hand tucked into his elbow. “It’s nothing, dear fellow. Perhaps Mr. Gillette’s offering will be better.”


	36. MISS The Missing Three-Quarter: Re-echo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pain echoes pain.

I held Watson in our room as he wept, Mrs. Staunton’s fate clearly echoing his own tragic loss. “Perhaps I should not have taken this case,” I murmured. 

He held me tighter, his voice clear though heavy with tears. “No. You need work. Better this than idleness turning your thoughts to the needle again.” 

I held him all that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This storylet is a POV-shift of my earlier offering, [Echo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3913522/chapters/12030260).


	37. MUSG - The Musgrave Ritual: A Scandal in Bharatpur

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abominable indeed.

It is no pleasant situation to flee for one’s life. 

The villagers had warned me of the couple, begged me to avoid that particular Himalayan slope. Now they hid in their houses as I ran – closely pursued by a roaring Mrs. Ricoletti, all ten-foot-three of her white hairy form. 

What she saw in a decommissioned, clubfooted sailor I never knew.


	38. NAVA - The Naval Treaty: A Crisis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suddenly they have other things to worry about than a treaty and a tadpole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** Crack. No, seriously, crack. And possibly a postulation in progress.

Holmes gazed intently at the boiling liquid dripping from the retort into a shallow dish. I stood over his shoulder, letter forgotten. 

“Now for it, Watson. If it turns red, all is well.” Holmes dipped a strip of treated paper into the dish. 

Blue. 

I gripped the chair, lightheaded.

“That settles it,” he said flatly. “You have to marry me.”


	39. NOBL - The Noble Bachelor: Research

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Holmes is always ready to go the extra mile for a case.

“Sixsh,” Holmes slurred as I led him upstairs. “Sixsh poshhible shhelect hotelllsh.”

“An expensive undertaking,” I said, hiding my smile as well as Holmes had hidden his inebriated state.

“Lord Shimon-shaint, oh bugger Shaint Shimon, paid ush well enough. Sixsh shherriesh, lunchesh.”

“Yet you’d found your quarry at the second establishment. You tried all six?”

“Had to. Eliminate. The imposshh’ble.”


	40. NORW - The Norwood Builder: Friesland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone may have exaggerated a wee bit. And may be a wee bit spoiled.

Never have I seen a worse-provisioned ship than that steamer. The beef was second-rate and that was bad enough, but when Holmes and I discovered that the gin was gone we almost panicked. 

Two days at sea without a dram. We took a great deal of vindictive pleasure in arresting Hans the Forger when we docked, then hit a pub.


	41. PRIO - The Priory School: Coda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not exactly a happy ending.

Another doctor supine on the bearskin, not alone this time. 

“Poor child,” Holmes murmured, his chin on Watson’s chest. “To be used as a pawn by such a brother, and to be returned to such a father.”

Watson thought of two other boys in a country squire’s seat born far apart in age, another distant sire, and kissed his lover.


	42. REDC - The Red Circle: Turnabout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Other landladies need a bit of help.

“So you see, my tenant is becoming a terrible problem,” the landlady said to the seated detective.

“Pays on time, and more than the usual rate?” the investigator queried.

“Oh his payments are princely, but the noise! The mess! The unsavoury visitors at all hours!” The woman wrung her hands. 

“Calm yourself, madame. I shall look into this,” said Poirot.


	43. REDH - The Red-Headed League: Whiskey-and-Soda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just after-case musings.

“Sometimes,” I said into my drink, “I think it ought not to be a crime to gull the stupid.” 

Holmes tsk’ed. “The gulled often have families who suffer; we end the business for them, if for no other reason. Consider, Watson; had Wilson been less idiotic we would have missed this robbery until after the fact.”

“Mm.”

We clinked glasses.


	44. REIG - The Reigate Squires: Fullest Freedom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another Watson rewrite needed. 
> 
> **Warning:** Explicitly a H/W pairing.

Ten days of unbridled homosexual congress with me, the Colonel, and every handsome servant on the estate (in countless combinations) restored my work-worn friend to a blithe mood.

“Dull case for a storyteller,” Holmes murmured, his head in my lap; George the footman dozed whilst sprawled across Holmes’ buttocks. 

“Maupertuis?” I kissed him. “I’ll concoct a strange little murder here.”


	45. RESI - The Resident Patient: The Undertakers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “…and with my aid and that of the inspector [Holmes] cut down the wretched object and laid it reverently under a sheet.”

“Never gets easier, does it,” Lanner said in his beer. 

I followed the inspector’s lead with my own pint. “No matter how many bodies you cut down or drag out of a river.” 

“Sutton was a bank robber, a killer and a contemptible coward.” Holmes paused, before lifting his own glass. “Nevertheless, Inspector, you’re quite right; it never gets easier.”


	46. RETI - The Retired Colourman: Cutting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every poet's met this guy.

"Two households, both alike in dignity –"

A groundling shouted "Two wealthy families fight, that's all you need say!"

# 

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent—"

"'Eighty-seven years ago our country began!'" one Gettysburg visitor called to the tall bearded man.

# 

"I saw the best minds of my generation–"

"Heroin addicts!" a beatnik howled.


	47. SCAN - A Scandal in Bohemia: Snookered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone seems to forget that little detail. Including Sherlock Holmes.

The crowd swarmed at the house as Irene's carriage appeared. Holmes hid his smile as he stepped forward—

"OUTTA THE WAY YOUSE BUMS!" 

That brassy directive, sent in a coloratura's trumpet, physically parted the street crowd. Holmes recoiled and Watson covered his ringing ears as Mrs. Norton strode into her house undisturbed. 

He'd forgotten she was born in New Jersey.


	48. SECO - The Second Stain: Some Recent Colonial Developments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The letter.

To the Queen of England and her ministers:

How can your hearts let you sleep at night – with the blood of children, old people and women dripping from our bales of tea and cotton? Would that I could show you the British soldiers standing over pits full of tiny bodies, make you hear their mothers' cries! 

Arjun, Rajah of Nizamabad


	49. SHOS - Shoscombe Old Place: Do the Right Thing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If only he had.

LADY BEATRICE DIED BEFORE RACE STOP SH

# 

"Foreclosure, prison, debt, disgrace, infamy." Watson lowered the Times; the lurid headline blaring of "Ghoul" Norbertson summarised the man's descent. 

"Roylott. Rucastle. Windibank. Blackguards abound who maltreat or kill women for their money." Holmes made a contemptuous gesture. "Bob Norbertson didn't even let her death stop him from feeding on his sister's corpse!"


	50. SIGN - The Sign of Four, Chs. 1-4: Pearl

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chance is a powerful thing.

John has often told me that he cannot begin to repay Stamford for the fortuitous suggestion that first sent him to share rooms with Mr. Holmes. 

I understand completely, for Mrs. Cecil Forrester has my eternal gratitude. Her suggestion, when I was confused and frightened, sent me to Baker Street, where I'd come to seek advice and found a spouse.


	51. SIGN The Sign of Four, Chs. 5-8: Foudre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bolt of lightning on a moonlit autumn night.

I'd been attracted to her from the first – to the honesty that shone through any plainness in her physical features. I admit that her background as an Army daughter may have influenced me as well.

But that night, in the presence of terror, she'd reached for my hand even as I did the same.

_She felt the same as I._


	52. SIGN The Sign of Four, Chs. 9-12: Workhouse Cough

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A rare actor indeed.

It was easy enough to portray the old mariner – simple observation of such fellows at the docks, coupled with deduction of what came from seamanship and what from a lifetime of poverty. 

But to act pleased for Watson, who exhibited all the signs of falling irrevocably in love with a girl who offered a life of respectability and romance? Impossible.


	53. SILV Silver Blaze: One For You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The little details are of infinite importance, true – but so is seeing the bigger picture.

One of Sherlock Holmes' most earnest adages is to _look up_. Many clues lurk in rafters overhead, higher than normal eyesight.

 

But here my own looking up merely saved us from a very long walk terminating in this selfsame spot. Holmes had been intent on the tracks we followed – whilst I'd looked up and seen tracks doubled back on themselves.


	54. SIXN Six Napoleons: Come Down Tomorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He wasn't exaggerating.

I'd dismissed him at first, thought he was a charlatan peddling detective quackery. 

But I've been too close for too long, seen that light in his eyes when he puts it all together. Uncanny fire. 

Young constables use his methods and get better results; us oldsters stopped complaining. 

He'd never become a copper. But we'd welcome him in a heartbeat.


	55. SOLI The Solitary Cyclist: Peculiar Persecution

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peculiar only for the time and place.

Watson set down his pipe. "Peculiar, Holmes?"

The sleuth gestured with his cigarette. "Very much so, Watson. John Vincent Harden, the well-known tobacco millionaire, is being sued."

Shaking his head, Watson fished for a cigar. "Some of those ridiculous medical quacks who keep claiming it causes lung cancer or some such, no doubt."

Holmes opened the snuffbox. "Worse. 'Second-hand smoke'."


	56. SPEC The Speckled Band: The Frying Pan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I think it's safe to say that none of Roylott's menagerie were treated well.

"Do you see it, Watson!" Holmes shouted, holding the candle aloft. 

A snake. 

Holmes knocked the reptile down and I caught it in a pillowcase. "Roylott!" I roared in rage at the monstrosity he'd perpetrated on his own daughters. 

We heard Roylott open his window and dash outside – where his last shriek was muffled by the snarl of the cheetah.


	57. STOC The Stockbroker's Clerk: Verbatim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a valuable skill to be multi-lingual.

_"…lost my crib…"_

_"…came a nasty cropper."_

_"…when the smash came…"_

_"…other chaps on the same lay as myself, and it was a perfect frost for a long time."_

 

#

 

Holmes read my notes aloud, enunciating young Hall Pycroft's phrases in a pitch-perfect cockney accent. Then he eyed me.

 

"Watson. You _will_ translate this into English before you publish, won't you?"


	58. STUD A Study in Scarlet: Pup

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not all the lodgers at Baker Street are pleased at the arrangement.

One set of rooms is as good as another to me. The new fellow stank of chemicals but left me alone. 

Then I found out what he did to the terrier. I smelled poison in that milk and barked a warning, but poor old Skip was deaf as well as nose-blind. 

I fled that household before the corpse was cold.


	59. SUSS The Sussex Vampire: Monster Mash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes it takes an unspeakable terror to stop an unspeakable terror.

A doll lay in the crib, and not the baby. The boy snarled.

 

"Jacky!"

 

He turned to face us, arrow in fist; his expressionless ice-blue eyes were one of the most terrifying things I'd ever seen.

 

Holmes smiled. "See if you can paralyse _this_ doggie, Jacky-lad." He released the lead.

 

And the Giant Rat of Sumatra rushed into the nursery.


	60. THOR The Problem of Thor Bridge: Another Problem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The unspoken problem of Thor Bridge.

I contemplated the blank paper. 

"The" problem of Thor Bridge? 

A man scorns his first wife for a younger and whiter woman, then wonders at his wife's anger. His love interest dismisses the woman's rage as a "tropical" temperament. 

On three continents I have seen that women are women – and grief and desperation can drive anyone to acts of madness.


	61. TWIS The Man With the Twisted Lip: Rewrite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once again the facts are changed to protect Victorian-era flatmates.

Sherlock Holmes snorted as he read my latest. "You just _happened_ to look for an addict who just _happened_ to be in Limehouse that very night, and you just _happened_ to find the exact drug-den in which I was working."

I waved his telegram before his nose. ST CLAIRS WIFE ALL OVER ME STOP COME AT ONCE DARLING STOP SH.


	62. VALL The Valley of Fear: Argus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How did Hermes defeat Hera's guardsman?

When I was cornered in a vault by two of Moriarty's gunmen, I only smiled. "I have yet to write the case that involves the gangs in Pennsylvania's coal country. Snow lay in the Gilmerton mountains…"

By the time I'd related Birdy Edwards' gang induction, both gunmen were fast asleep and I simply walked around them to effect my escape.


	63. VEIL The Veiled Lodger: They Seek Her Here, They Seek Her There

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You gotta admit, the title would make a great name for a masked vigilante.

"Watson." Holmes stared at the evening paper. "I may have started something."

I read the account. A brute of a wife-beating husband found dead, traces of prussic acid on his lips. Five long scratches like a lion's claws in the wall above his corpse.

And the scrawled words, "My life is not my own. Now it brings justice to others."


	64. WIST Wisteria Lodge: I See No Charm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well, of course he couldn't see it.

Mr. Scott Eccles was beet-red with anger. "I've just read your account of my poor Miguel's death in the Strand!" (Naturally I'd disguised our similar natures in my story.) "'No charm'?"

"Mr. Eccles—" 

Our client broke off Holmes' placating tone and unfastened his flies, shoving both trousers and pants to his knees. "There!" 

We both stared.

"Ah," said Holmes.


	65. YELL  The Yellow Face: At the Window

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What does Lucy think of this?

Mummy says she must play dress-up in this new house. 

This isn't fun; there are no other little girls to play with. But if she doesn't play this dress-up game Mummy won't come to her. 

The mask is hot and the gloves are too. She wonders when she will meet her new Papa, and when she will win the game.


End file.
